


Boy That Time Forgot

by femaletodd



Category: Batman (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Alfred being knowing but isn't he always, Amnesiac!Jason but not in the way you'd think, Banter between Batbros, Bruce & Jason Centric as all my fics tend to be, But don't we all?, Damian being snotty but i love him okay, Gen, Invented Villain, Jason has some hidden feelings, Like An Issue of Batman except Not, Villain pontification, like feelings feelings, some curses (i can't go without curses guys come on)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-29
Updated: 2016-10-29
Packaged: 2018-08-27 20:01:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8414800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/femaletodd/pseuds/femaletodd
Summary: He faltered but only for a second before the words jumped out of him, wary and bullet-fire: “The bastard who attacked me yesterday--” He brought a hand around the back of his neck and scratched the skin there as he forced his tone to be extra casual. “--I'm pretty sure he took my muscle memory.”If Flash’s powers were his speed and Green Lantern's his ring-- Jason’s was this.What was he without it?He doesn't want to know.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I tried to do present-tense form except I really am just very used to past-tense so forgive the difference. I didn't feel like going back and changing the format.

 

The whip of his zip-line cuts through the air with a sharp clang. The sound arouses attention from the mob gathered in the middle of the abandoned truck yard. He isn’t particularly hiding himself so when their eyes go up, they instantly see him. There’s not even a breath of waiting before guns lift out of their pocket and aim at where he stands on top of the highest pile of cars.

He smirks and waves at them. “Hi,”

Their grips on the guns tighten and their eyes harden. 

“What are you doing here, Hood?” One of them asks.

Red Hood surveys each member and their position from his vantage point and as his mind is deducing the best ways of countering, he shrugs and says: “Was hanging around, actually. I totally came by you guys discussing a major arms-deal operation by coincidence.” Then, he tilts his head and narrows his eyes behind the helmet covering his face. “Or did I?”

The leader of the mob shouts out an incoherent order that sounds like: “Kill that son of a bitch!”

As the first few shots are fired, he's already in the air, twirling with his legs kicking up at the sky. He unholsters his firearms from his outer thighs and starts shooting while in mid-air.

Rubber pellets. Only to please the Boss, of course. Still hurt like a bitch.

There's a shower of rapid-fire bullets heading straight for him, which he is only able to dodge by executing a few complicated but perfectly accurate maneuvers. Two of the bullets still manage to graze his arm and thigh though. 

As he drops to the ground on his two feet, he's immediately faced with three thugs. He grabs the gun-toting man in front of him and tosses him to the man on the left. They fall to the side while he takes down the one to the right.

Five more rush over to him, some holding a few heavy car parts. They ambush him from all sides and he ducks as they crowd closer. Once they're in position, he activates the electric charges in his gloves and gives them quite a shock.

He sees two remaining thugs who are running from the scene, towards one of the vehicles they came in.

Red Hood throws two of his Batarangs at them and before they know it, they're being tied up.

“All in a day’s work,” He mutters as he grabs his phone out of his jacket’s pocket and starts typing out a text to GCPD. As he presses the send button, he hears a click.

But he hears it too late.

“Very well done, Mr. Hood.” says the man behind him. He is soft-spoken with little hints of an accent seeping through but Jason can sense the malice deep within. “That took you what? 30 minutes tops? So very impressive.”

Jason means to turn his head to the side to check out the man threatening him but the gun held to the back of his helmet slams at him with a sharp clack. The pressure of the barrel increases tenfold on his helmet and it’s a warning force that spells trouble if he so much as moves. He goes back to stare off in the distance all the while calculating some way to get out of this. He does have his hands by his side, can reach for his taser or batarangs from under his jacket. What will be easier, of course, is the knife he hid under the sleeve of his jacket. He just has to shuffle a little on his feet and it would slide down to his hand before the guy could notice.

But first of all, who the fuck was this guy?

“What do you want?” Jason asks testily.

“Oh, me, I want nothing.” The stranger says, very calmly. “My employer, however, wants you to suffer after what a disappointing prodigy you turned out to be.”

Oh, now Jason knows exactly what kind of situation he is in. 

He turns his head despite the warning pressure on his helmet and sees a man dressed all in white. His features are unrecognizable to Jason, but the hard set of his jaw and the deadly eyes are telling.

Black Mask has sent someone experienced in the art of a silent kill after Red Hood betrayed him out of millions of dollars.

_ Had that one coming _ . Jason thought, looking back to the front.

“I was never his prodigy,” He objects. “He just liked to think so.”

Funny how he isn't feeling the need to get out of this situation. He knows some of the maneuvers he could try despite this lethal position but his limbs feel like lead.

Is it some kind of hypnotic power the assassin is using? Or is it just his masochistic will to see what this refreshing encounter could result in?

Funny. He never pegged himself as an adrenaline junkie.

“Yes, well,” The assassin says. “It felt more polite than calling you a traitor.”

“You're about to kill me,” Jason snorts, a wry grin molding his face. “What does it matter if you're polite?”

“Oh, I'm not going to kill you though I can see you wish I would.” For an assassin, he talks a lot. What was it Tim called it? Villain Pontification? Maybe, Jason was wrong and the man behind him isn't an assassin but if he isn't here to kill Jason, what was he employed for? Jason gets the sinking feeling that it has to do with torture and after what he’s been through, he is really in no mood for-- 

“Oh no, my clients hire me for one expertise only: to wipe the slate clean.” The assassin-- or not?-- says.

What?

“Goodbye, Mr. Hood.” says the man behind him as the trigger is pulled.

Jason can’t for the life of him move. He urges his limbs-- his heart thumping is in his chest-- to cooperate but they’re frozen. This is strange. Why can’t he move?

BANG.

He feels it hurt, not like a bullet would though. That’s something he should be thankful for, but the pain is excruciating enough that he almost thinks a bullet would have been better. If it had gone through his brain, he’d be dead almost immediately. But this-- it's a slow, dull pain that keeps flickering outward, outward, outward. It’s like a clawing hand is in the center of his head and it keeps trying to catch a hold of his brain.

Not trying-- it has caught a hold on him.

The world is bleached out before him.

He blinks and blinks, trying to see past the acute pain in the back of his head but it won’t let him go, it’s caught him and he can’t think past it.

He falls forward, his white-knuckled grip on the phone loosening.

_ How did I not remember the phone was in my hand all along?  _ That thought is his last coherent one before every thought slips away from him like his mind is going upstream, fighting against a powerful tide. 

It feels like something important is being leached away from him, but he just can't grasp what that something important is. 

He closes his eyes and thinks-- thinks back to-- Huh, how funny, he can't remember.

He passes out somewhere between that realization.

  
  
  
  


“Harvey found one of your guys unconscious in an abandoned truck yard by the south side.” Gordon didn't waste time in informing Batman. “Didn't know what to do with him so thought you’d take him off our hands.”

Bruce’s brow creases as his dive from one building to the next comes to an abrupt halt.

“Who?” He asks in a growl. It can't be Damian. He just talked with the boy through the comm-link. His fourteen year old Robin and biological son is taking it solo for now but he assured Bruce that he would call for Batman’s help if he needed help.

“Not that I will,” Damian Wayne had assured Bruce in a haughty tone.

As for the others, Dick was in Bludhaven as far as Bruce knew and Tim-- Tim has an alarm system set up in his suit that automatically sends messages to his allies when he's in danger or is attacked without a warning.

And Duke Thomas had--

“It's that Red Hood guy,” Gordon tells him before his thoughts can reach their own inevitable conclusion. “I had half a mind to throw the guy behind bars for some of his infamous antics but he looks bad, like really bad. You need to come and take him right now.”

Bruce almost wants to swear under his breath but controls himself and asks Gordon to meet him at the rooftop of GCPD headquarters.

  
  
  
  
  


Red Hood’s helmet was taken off somewhere along his visit to the headquarters because Jason’s face is fully exposed, bare for the world to survey at their leisure. His features are unmarked by traces of anger or bravado. It’s wide-open and vulnerable like a wound, relaxed from sleep or some other terrible thing Batman has no idea about at this moment.

Perhaps, more importantly, the boy does look bad. He’s ashen-pale, his breathing hard and heavy and he hangs limply off of a cop’s shoulder, one of his arm slack at his side and the other hooked around the cop’s neck.

“You know, he looks familiar to me somehow.” Gordon muses out loud, jolting Batman out of his keen observation.

Bruce is worried but he won’t let it show.

“You didn't have to take off his helmet,” He comments instead of letting Gordon’s astute deduction skills scramble his demeanor.

“I didn't,” Gordon retorts and crosses his arms, a peeved look on his face. “Harvey did and personally, I don’t blame him. The boy was breathing weird under there and Harvey was checking on him out of concern.”

Bruce wants to snort. Bullock may be a good guy but his intentions weren't always entirely altruistic. 

Not like Jason’s face being revealed and possibly identified to who knows how many GCPD officers is a big matter of concern right now, anyway.

Gordon describes to him the way Jason was found and the only deduction Bruce can make afterward is that Jason was in the middle of a field mission when somebody unaccounted for ambushed him, from behind possibly. Whatever or whoever attacked Jason, there isn’t physical evidence of any injury as far as Bruce’s sharp eyes can see.

He jumps off the ledge and heads over to Jason and the cop holding Jason. The blond lieutenant side-eyes Batman’s approaching figure warily.

He doesn't wait for Batman’s demand to hand over Jason. He just holds out Jason’s unconscious body a feet away from him as Batman closes in and once Batman has grabbed Jason by the waist, he lets go like his hands would catch on fire.

Batman doesn't wonder about the cop’s actions. He knows what an intimidating figure he makes to the rest of the human world.

He looks to Gordon and gives a nod.

Gordon doesn't so much as blink as Batman gets out of there with a jump off the ledge carrying a two-hundred-pound man in his arm.

The free fall is still the very best part of being Batman but he has more urgent things to take care of than enjoy the wind in his ear, his cape rustling behind him as he charges face-first, straight into the concrete spires and edifices of Gotham.

With one arm up, he shoots toward the building to his left and swings through the city.

  
  
  
  


Alfred is already at the entrance of the Bat-Cave as the Batmobile rushes in. The door of the Batmobile shoots open and Alfred stares down at Batman first before switching his gaze to the one sprawled over next to him.

“Well then,” Alfred huffs out. Bruce takes off his cowl and jumps out of the Batmobile with Jason curved over his shoulder. Jason’s limp on him. He would move even the slightest if he was just asleep but Batman hasn’t seen him do so.

It isn’t like Bruce has any hope that Jason was struck with a sleeping gas bomb. It was always more with Batman. Nothing was ever as simple as a sleeping gas bomb.

“Have you taken any tests, other than checking his vitals?” Alfred asks as Bruce puts Jason down on top of the stretcher that had seen him and many Robins, Batgirls and other friends lay on it. Jason lies serene, still breathing shallow, his face pale. 

At least, these are his only symptoms, as far as Bruce can see. It isn’t enough to diagnose Jason.

Somebody attacked him and now, Jason is like this. What was the nature of the attack? Was it mystical, psychological or physical?

“I took his blood samples,” Bruce informs Alfred, checking over Jason from top to bottom, looking for any other signs that may indicate what hit Jason.

Alfred has the diaphragm of his electronic device under Jason’s shirt, right where his heart must beat weakly. His gaze is fixed on the device connected to the diaphragm as it beeps and beeps before letting out a protracted ring. The vitals appear on the device’s screen-- just as Bruce had manually approximated while Batmobile had been on autopilot. 

Jason’s blood pressure is low, but not lethally so. Neither is his heart, particularly in the danger zone. Nothing about his vitals show exactly what’s wrong with Jason. Once Alfred takes off Jason’s jacket and suit underneath, both of them see clearly that there are no nasty lacerations that mark his freckle-dotted, scar-ridden torso nor are there any bullets embedded on Jason’s body that would need to be taken out. There are no wounds, other than a few scrapes here and there. 

Alfred is a bit lost for a moment, studying Jason with a perturbed grimace on his face.

“Has he--” Alfred looks up at Bruce, his eyebrows crease in worry. “Did he have his hood on when he was attacked?”

“Yes,” Bruce answers. That much he knows, at least. What he doesn’t know but assumes is that Jason was hit in the back of his head. Only because of how Jason was lying when Harvey found him. His gaze flickers there. “Let’s turn him over. Check his head. That’s where he was hit, I think.”

“But with the hood on--” Alfred adds as they turn Jason over. Once Jason is lying prone on the stretcher, Alfred sifts through Jason’s hair, pushing the strands away so he can take a look at his scalp. Alfred frowns, tracing his finger through the flesh as he continues: “--there’s some protection for Master Jason, isn’t there?”

“I don’t know,” Bruce says. When Alfred gives him a knowing look, he sighs and looks away: “I mean, yes, there’s protection from physical attacks, but not if it was something psychological.”

“Really?” Alfred questions, appearing doubtful. His frown deepens, gaze dipping. “Master Tim informed me that the hood has some highly advanced technology implemented on it.”

“Yes, well, Jason’s not like Tim.” Bruce amends. “He could have implemented in it a few security measures against psionic attacks but he doesn’t rely on tech as much as he does on his own fists and the amount of arsenal at his beck and call.” He lifts the flap of Jason’s jacket that was lying askew at Jason’s side and turns it over so Alfred can see the knives, guns and various other sharp and deadly weapons attached to the lining. 

Alfred clicks his tongue, utterly dismissive in the face of their glinting lethality.

“I am aware, Master Bruce.” Alfred says, looking away. “You can’t blame Master Jason for being cautious. After what he’s been through, it’s no surprise to me that he likes to keep weapons close to him.”

Bruce lets go of the flap, feeling his throat coat with bitter bile as he pushes away from the stretcher and turns away. “I’ll go check his blood samples while you’re looking him over. Tell me if you’ve found something.”

Alfred nods and Bruce knows as he walks away that Alfred is giving him that sad look he sometimes got when he thought no-one was looking.

  
  
  
  


Bruce isn't in the Manor when Jason awakens the next day, but he gets to hear Alfred’s relieved tone and Jason’s gruff undertones in the background when Alfred calls him in the afternoon.

“I fear we may have overestimated what happened to Master Todd.” Alfred says.

Bruce concentrates on the bang of a cabinet and the scuffle of shoes on the floor of the kitchen that comes from the other side of the phone. He appreciates the sounds because they are signs of Jason doing everyday things in the kitchen of his home. They're normal. 

It should help erase the little ball of stress that lingers in his chest. It doesn't.

“How's his memory? Any dizzy spells?” Bruce inquires because skepticism and caution go hand in hand when it concerns him.

“Not that I can see, sir.” Alfred replies. “He looks the same as ever.”

“Thanks, Alf,” Bruce hears Jason say amongst a few cluttering noises-- like he's setting out a ceramic plate on the counter table. “Hope that wasn't a subtle dig at me. Where's the mayo, by the way?” Bruce hears the familiar creak of their refrigerator door being opened.

“We don't keep such things here, Master Todd.” Alfred proclaims in disapproval, his voice sounding far away. “Here. Have this.”

Jason snorts and Bruce can imagine him shaking his head in amusement. “You're such a mom, Alf.”

Even when he's not there, he has the vivid image of his kitchen-- with Jason and Alfred standing near the fridge arguing about what was proper sustenance and what wasn't. Jason waving his arms above his body in fake aggravation while Alfred kept a visibly irritated look off his composed, butlery mask. 

“Hey, just because Bruce doesn’t mind you telling him to eat his vegetables doesn’t mean I have to listen to you.”

“Apparently, because not listening to me is unwise and you seem to be happy enough making unwise decisions everyday.”

“Oh my god.”

Bruce wants to close his eyes and drown himself in it.

There's a moment where their voices taper to a lower register that he can't hear before Alfred comes back and picks up the phone.

“Apologies, Master Bruce. I was distracted by Master Jason’s appalling taste in food.”

“Greasy, fattening and delightfully tasty, you mean?” Jason hollers from the back, letting out a small chuckle.

Bruce wants to be there.

Wants to open his palm and snatch that sound tightly in his hand.

It's a strain on his throat, the want. He holds it back and keeps his voice level.

“Keep an eye on him.” He warns Alfred. “Ask him what happened the night before. Does he have any idea who it was? Did he get--”

“It would be better--” Alfred interrupts in an exasperated tone. “-- if you were to come here and ask him yourself.”

“I will,” Bruce affirms. “Just know that we aren't out of the woods yet. Not until I say so. So keep him there till I get there.”

“Yes, sir.”

When Bruce disconnects the call, he notices his secretary standing by the doorway, giving him a wide-eyed look.

He raises a brow and the realization comes slowly to him that he may appear different to her-- not right, not the normal Bruce Wayne. He lets his expression turn soft and warm once that realization sticks.

“Yes?” He asks, his features now malleable instead of the hard, rocky ridges they tended towards when he was worried or stressed or-- or--

She blinks a few times before gaining back her composure.

“Um, sorry to interrupt--” She says, approaching his desk in her pencil gray skirt and her dirty blond hair bound back by a hair clip. “--but I was just wondering if you were going to attend the daily meeting today or not?” 

He nods, offering her a smile that only wavers the slightest bit. His mind is still churning over the details of yesterday.

Some unknown person had sneaked up on Jason and was able to attack him from behind. He could've killed Jason a thousand times over but he hadn't. He could have injected Jason with a psychologically harmful drug but he hadn't. Not as far as Alfred can see, anyway.

What had he done then?

“Are you okay?” His secretary asks him and it takes him a minute to turn his attention back to her concerned face.

Her brown eyes blink at him owlishly, naively.

He shakes his head, no longer interested in keeping the mask up. He'd just mess it up again, the way his mind is today.

“Nothing.” He replies, his voice coming out curt despite all his efforts to keep that down-- that acid, that stress ball-- deeper inside a dark cavern where no-one could see. “Call Mr. Bunch and tell him I have a few things to go over with him.”

“Yes, sir.” She says, gives him a last, scrutinizing look before she turns and walks away.

Bruce brings his hand up to his chin with his thumb hovering over his cheek and thinks about the many ways all this-- the ordinary sounds of Jason cluttering through his kitchen-- could still turn to shit.

  
  
  
  
  


Bruce enters the living room with Alfred walking behind him and finds Damian and Jason glaring at each other from across the room. They're both sitting on the corbeau-colored leather sofas on either side of the room. Damian has his arms pulled across his chest and a scowl on his face while Jason has his elbows on his knees and a strained look on his face.

“Is everything okay?” Bruce asks, interrupting their tense silence. They both look to him with twin frowns and turn away immediately. Bruce finds his eyes drawn toward the look on Jason’s face. While Damian’s is scowly and messy, Jason’s is odd. 

“Jason?” He calls.

Jason twitches where he sits, but keeps his head turned away. Bruce reluctantly faces Damian’s menacing look and raises a brow.

“Damian?” Bruce says next questioningly.

Damian turns to face Bruce bodily with his arms crossed and rolls his eyes. He gestures with the tilt of his head toward Jason and snorts. “I always thought he was useless and now somebody has proved it for me.”

Bruce is incontrovertibly confused. Jason, if it was possible, hunches further over himself at Damian’s biting words. It is as if he wants to counter those words, but something has him holding back. It is unlike a tongue-tied speechlessness nor is it a muted acceptance, but it feels something along the lines of self-loathing or fear.

Then Bruce goes through Damian’s words in his mind once again and backtracks to the questions that had continuously badgered him throughout the day. Who had attacked Jason? And if not harm him physically or psychologically, how else could they harm him?

Bruce had eliminated the choices down to a spiritual element but it wasn’t even that complicated, was it?

It was staring him right in the face.

Jason wasn’t the kind who stuck to one place long, especially not Wayne Manor. By this time, knowing that Bruce was coming home, he would have done anything to get out of here. If he’d known he was okay, he wouldn’t still be here.

Which meant Jason knew something was wrong with him and maybe even,  _ what _ was wrong with him.

“Damian,” Bruce found that his voice came out deep and low. Like the echoing rumbles of the Dark Knight, they resonate loud and heavy through the living room. “I need to talk to Jason. Alone.”

Damian’s is a face of barely held fury-- all knots and furrows between brows-- yet an inner thrum of satisfaction rolls through his shoulders and body as he gives out another snort-- this one, more disdainful than the last-- before walking away with a smooth, steady ease. 

Alfred watches him go out the door and into the hallway before pulling his eyes back to Bruce, who stands still and to Jason, who sits tense.

He knows Master Bruce won’t mind Alfred standing just a few feet behind, watching their coming interaction like a silent fly on the wall. He even knows that the secrets Jason is willing to share with Master Bruce, he’s willing to share with Alfred too. Not like an occasion ever requires that Alfred not know what Master Bruce knows. Yet Alfred can tell from one look to the next that this isn’t the type of atmosphere he should intrude on, even with his welcomed, silent presence. So he feels it best to go out the living room and shut the door behind him.

Knows Master Bruce will tell him later on. Maybe, even right after this conversation ends. He stands out in the hall with his gaze floating up to the ceiling and an ever-schooled frown on his face.

He had known Master Jason was hiding something from him the whole day but he hadn’t been able to get anything out of the boy. 

Master Damian, however, is still much like a loaded gun, ever-ready and ever-enthusiastic to shoot where it will hurt most. That boy, he has honed skills that none his age would ever acquire. So with his keen eyes and with an ever sharper tone, he bludgeons a person until they don’t even have to come out and say it. The answer will come out just in the tensing of the jaw or in the hunch of one’s shoulders. 

Master Damian still has yet to learn that the heart is not a place that should ever be played with in such a brutal manner. Even psychotic supervillains’ hearts’ had weaknesses-- sore spots-- and once those weaknesses were attacked, you never knew what the outcome could be. Some would lash out, reasonably.

Others… had learned to hold it together, hold it so deep in their chest that every muscle was coiled on itself, posture crooked with the effort of it, hands braided together looking so unnatural with the oppression of only the very weaknesses that defined humanity. 

How could Alfred Pennyworth still have hope to teach Master Damian what it was to  _ feel _ and despite it all, still keep trudging on when Master Bruce and Master Jason kept being so repressive, so persecuting to their own emotions?

  
  
  
  
  
  


It was silent in the room after Alfred closed the door.

Jason kept his eyes fixated on the carpet. His gaze could strike fires, he was staring down that hard. Quietly, with barely a whisper, Bruce swept by and took a seat across from Jason. Right where Damian had seated himself insolently across from Jason just a few minutes ago. Insolently, he had tipped his head up. Insolently, he had jutted his chin forward and with green eyes that were fiery and knowing and just a little smug, he had challenged Jason to a sparring match.

Except a sparring match was the last thing Jason could participate in right now, drowning as he was in his own self-loathing, in his own fear of tomorrow, fear of never getting it back. Drowning in his late but eventual recognition of what exactly Black Mask’s hire did to him.

Damian Wayne was a smart little fucker and he knew it. Like a petty little child, he had come to taunt Jason with his discovery. He had covertly been watching Jason and his actions the whole day. Perhaps, he had seen the clumsy little trip of Jason’s feet that he had initially dismissed as the by-product of his sleepy state. Except it kept happening. His every step had felt slanted like his balance was off somehow. Tilted.

Perhaps, Damian saw the panic he went through when he almost touched the handle of one of the motorcycles in the Batcave and knew he had no idea how to ride it. Or maybe, the moment he tried out a simple flip and twirl. And fell on his own ass.

Or maybe he had watched Jason stand before a heavy, sagging punching bag with one foot forward and his shoulders squared, preparing himself to hit but knowing without any doubt that it was wrong somehow. That his fighting form was not the same as he knew it to be.

All of these motion were simple-- everyday actions. Some he was just born with and some he had cultivated for himself. Movements that he had executed subconsciously all the time. 

_ Muscle memory, _ his mind provides helpfully.  _ That's what that fucker took from me. And maybe, even the concepts of fighting I had learned all those years ago. _

Jason had been-- not graceful, but something like it. Something tough and prowling and sure. Like a cheetah, looking all the predators in the eye, he had rolled through the floor with his claws and his agility and his self-confidence. 

He had been the king at the top of the world.

When an enemy swiped him with a metal bar, his muscles would already be coiled to jump up and widen his legs as he twirled and swung above them. So fast that they wouldn’t see him coming from behind. 

He knew what power he had in his fists. How to pull it inward and let it blow.

He knew the basics-- the essentials-- but his instincts, his reflexes, his self-assured abilities had left him barren and dry and fucked beyond measure.

He was nothing now. Just bones and muscles.

And fear.

He was fear too.

“Jason?” Bruce murmured then, tugging him out of the shroud of misery that cast over him like a cloud.

Jason’s eyes caught Bruce’s electric blue ones and he wondered if he would see anything like Damian in them. For now, they were gentle and curious and light. Nothing like they could be. Like dangerous hooks. Like maddened stars shining in the dark.

Were they ever vindictive though? He couldn’t see that. He saw Bruce as many things, but it wasn’t in him to be vindictive. Neither was it in him to be outright malicious. The son still had many things to learn from his father.

And how could Jason ask help of this man? When all he had been trying to do was prove himself. He didn’t need favors. He needed to pay off his debts. He needed to get this need inside him off of himself. He needed to-- 

Let it go.

_ Let it go. _

Desperation had always been a bad color on Jason. So had been jealousy.

So he’d been trying to rip it off himself. Trying to get a new color on him, one that didn’t smell quite like carbon and ammonia. One that wasn’t drab and smudged over and filled with--  _ did he care for me? Did he ever really-- _

One that  _ wasn’t  _ ugly.

“Jason,” spoke Bruce with a gargantuan weight in his tone. The soft, open look on his face had been shut down long ago, replaced by hardened lines when Jason wasn't seeing. A grimace twisted Bruce’s mouth-- one that became increasingly tightened the more silence went on. The more Jason didn’t say, the more Bruce inferred that it was worse, worse still, the worst thing that he could hardly even imagine. 

“Tell me,” demanded Bruce with this complicated look on his face.

It was inevitable that Jason told Bruce. If he didn’t, Damian would with a cheerfulness that belied his actual personality. It was as easy as that.

Jason tried to keep the shame from his face and eyes. Kept his gaze on Bruce’s despite all his nerves buzzing at him to avoid eye contact as he braced himself to admit weakness.

He opened his mouth.

_ I thought I was done with all this. With this feeling of helplessness. _

He faltered but only for a second before the words jumped out of him, wary and like bullet-fire: “The bastard who attacked me yesterday--” He brought a hand around the back of his neck and scratched the skin there as he forced his tone to be extra casual. “--I'm pretty sure he took my muscle memory.”

If Flash’s powers were his speed and Green Lantern's his ring-- Jason’s was  _ this _ .

What was he without it?

He doesn't want to know.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


It’s two days later that Jason finds it in him to venture down the stairs leading to the Batcave and approach Bruce standing close to the Batcom. Bruce is dressed in all grays and blacks, ready to be patrol-soldier of the night except fiercer than that sounds. Tints of neon blue like rays of light fall over the broad-shouldered man’s firm posture and leave a shadowy imprint behind him.

Without the cowl on, the shadow Bruce casts on the floor is subpar quite honestly, but Jason prefers it. Illustrates the man perfectly-- the conflict of dual identities. The face is more of a cowl than the material one that’s donned anyway. Batman’s armor and Bruce’s face-- two lethalities-- as one. If criminals were to see Bruce’s exposed face jump out at them from above, they would likely be more scared. Well, if Bruce were to keep that slightly unhinged, livid look on his face that Jason had seen a few times before. 

Jason knows the sounds of his footfalls against the ground had been indication enough to Bruce that he’s there but Bruce is preoccupied. His eyes are focused intently on the screen where some information about this and that is showcased. Mirror image of the screen reflects on the tranced, grey-eyed look on Bruce’s face.

Jason looks up at the screen too to see what the fuss is all about and sees previous locations, police reports, and other hacked info about gangs surrounding or working for Black Mask. 

Jason skims through them and sighs, burying his hands on the pockets of his jeans.

So at least, one of his questions is answered. Bruce really is focusing on Jason’s problem instead of-- instead of dealing with any of the other very important shit that he could be dealing with.

It’s at once a breath of relief and a pang of guilt in his system.

He can never be happy with anything. He had come down here with the intention to question Bruce’s progress but seeing the man already intensely centered to this particular mission has him with even less words than he had to begin with.

He opens his mouth and closes it. Fiddles with the fingers inside his pockets, clenching them around the already-congested fabric, unfolding his clenching fingers and pressing them inward, inward until he can pull them nowhere but through. 

Through, it was then.

He blows out air through his nose and asks, “So what have you found out so far?” 

Bruce is quiet but only for a few awkward seconds. His head steadily lowers after he lets his concentration breaks. If he were in the middle of an epiphany, he would have told Jason to be quiet for a few minutes through some non-verbal gesture. Since he isn’t-- and Jason knew he wasn’t, there was a difference between an epiphany trance and a normal Bruce-is-just-focusing-on-his-thoughts trance-- he turns around bodily to meet Jason’s eyes.

“I can’t find anything about the man you described--” Bruce begins without much ado and adds with a stiff optimism: “--so far. I’ve tried to beat it out of some of Black Mask’s closer associates. They haven’t said anything of substance. But then again, if this was a mercenary, it’s possible he was from out-of-town or even from abroad. The whole transaction may just have happened online or through calls. 

“That’s where I’m going to be digging in next: Black Mask’s accounts.” Bruce continues and Jason nods, because sure, that sounds possible. Except he has doubts if it was just done online. Bruce keeps on going, though. It’s like he just needs to say the next part, not for Jason but for himself: “He must have many of them hidden away in different cities, different countries but I suspect Tim has ways to get through that. Which is why I wanted to know if you’d mind Tim knowing about your… situation.”

Bruce said ‘situation’ with such delicacy, such carefulness. The rest, he had no problems saying. Jason always seems to forget that part about Bruce. The one that was awkward for all the wrong things. Who cared what you called it? Jason was paralyzed with fear when he thought about fighting. Jason couldn’t for the life of him pull off a proper punch or kick, even if he’d learned and relearned it all those years ago. 

He couldn’t perform like the fearless, trigger-happy, arrogant bastard that Red Hood had meant to be.

And now, his replacement needed to know about it. 

“Does he have to know?” Jason asks, feeling gruff and off-base. Tim was a nice guy and all, but this was all kinds of humiliating. Wasn’t Damian-- that catty jerk-- enough?

“Well,” Bruce seemed to think it through. A smile lights up his face as if some memory had hit him all of a sudden and as a result of it, the ever-pragmatic Bruce shakes his head and says: “I did promise you all unconditional truths that one time.” 

Jason raises a brow and complains: “You bring up that promise against me?”

_ He  _ had been the one who’d been most insistent upon that promise. Bruce had lied far too many times for Jason to make up with him without that tiny binding vow.

It had been the first time Jason had felt optimistic about their schismed relationship.

“Well, I could half-lie about it to him,” Bruce shrugs as if it’s no hair off his back. “But I think it will help us better with the investigation if Tim knows the whole picture rather than a slightly omitted version of the picture.”

Jason glares at him. Bruce acting all flippant to demonstrate his point just makes this even harder to bear. He doesn’t feel irked that Bruce is still staying true to the promise, but he is irked that he has given up even the pretense of dignity.

He can just imagine Tim’s reaction. Sympathetic but mostly intent on the investigation part. Still, he shudders to hear the awkward few words out of Tim’s mouth when he will face Jason after knowing the fact. Sympathetic yet trying hard to hide it.

Jason’s whole world really does revolve around his fists and when he can’t make them talk for him, he’s very much not himself.

_ This’ll feel weird for awhile, won’t it? _ Jason thinks to himself with irritation.

Finally, he gives it up with a sigh and says: “Sure, tell Tim. Tell the whole world. Jason isn’t physically unable to fight but he just _ can’t _ fight.” Even the idea of it infuriates him. He clenches his fists and swings it down to his side. His neck is fraught with tension and his teeth are gritted as he swears aloud: “Fuck!”

 

“Jason…” Bruce murmurs, his eyes trailing through Jason’s taut form.

The fire that has always lived within Jason burns ever brighter, perhaps even brighter than before. And yet, like Jason himself just said,  _ he can’t fight _ .

Despite the fire.

It really is a troubling thing to see and know.

Bruce knows how important it is to Jason. He has pushed away all the other cases-- all of them-- because he _ knows _ . 

He’s been there before. Without legs to use. Just able to watch the moon rise and lower on the sky. Not being able to fight, for people like him, is a damning thing.

Because then you are left with your own version of hell. Whatever that may be. Thoughts spiraling away uncontrollably to their haunted descent. The adrenaline that you had no way to work with except with ineffectual punches to walls or slamming the door too hard or tossing ostentatious pots and vases out of tables in an anger that made you tremble.

For Jason, fighting has a slightly different meaning. For much of Jason’s life, fighting is all Jason had known. He has breathed it. He has eaten it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It’s in his lungs. It’s the pulse that trips at his carotid artery. It’s the buzzing of his nerves. It moves the earth beneath him.

Without it, Bruce knows he could have survived. Before.

Not now. Not after his death-- when he was broken beyond repair. Not after he found his death unavenged-- when he felt the unbearable twist of the knife that was the betrayal. Not after he failed to take his revenge-- when the acidic anger drained away and only the shattered pieces of his soul were left to be picked up one-by-one.

Not after.

So Jason stands there with all the self-loathing that chokes him and tightens it up into knots around himself. It’s the physical hatred that hurts Bruce’s sight. Makes him want to reach his hand out and rest it on Jason’s shoulder.

“I--” Bruce swallows. The shoulder he holds is bunched up within, so much so that it shivers beneath his palm. “I will make you another promise that I intend to keep.”

Jason stops shaking. His gaze swivels over to Bruce’s and finds a home there. A glimpse of expectation amongst all their black despondency. Youth and despair all tied up in one look.

_ Please, don’t let me break it _ . Bruce thinks with trepidation before he vows: “I promise that I’ll find some way to return your ability back to you.”

Jason wants to pretend disbelief. The eyebrows that drift upward, the eyes that widen in hysteria and the lips that half-open to let out breaths of incredulity tell Bruce that much. However, hope wins out. Jason’s expression gets caught at the edges before all the ready expressions of dismissal tumble down. 

So that by the end, his brows narrow slightly, eyes that appear just a bit watery dip down and Jason nods his head to the floor.

“Okay,” Jason says in a cracked voice before he lifts his head and plasters a tight grin on his face. “You better keep that promise or I swear to god, Bruce, I will come for you. Like a bloodhound, I will not keep chasing you till you’re dead.”

It’s an empty threat as Jason’s many threats tend to be. The boy has too many spiteful words to give out, not many blood-soaked intentions he ever carries out.

Bruce has learned that the hard way too.

What he finds more difficult to handle are Jason’s tears. It’s so much harder making promises to Jason than all his other legacies because he doesn’t want to let down this boy once again. He already has so many times. It’d be nice to do this right by him, for once.

It’d be really nice.

  
  
  
  
  


Jason finds that more and more often, he’s in the kitchen, helping Alfred cut pies and even taste them so he can tell Alfred how superb they are. Pie-cutting is not all he does. He’s found that he can cook a few simple dishes if he has the ingredients and the time and the patience.

The patience part he had to work on because sometimes, his dishes end up like a lukewarm soup with bits and pieces in it. And it’s the worst feeling because hey! Here’s another part of his life he can totally, epically fail at.

Alfred is a good teacher though and he watches out for the minor mistakes Jason can make with recipe amount or simmering the pot just enough to get it magically perfect. 

It’s all very nice. 

Domestic.

He can totally imagine himself as a second-Alfred. He even helps Batman sometimes as Penny-three. It’s just as dissatisfying as he’d always thought it would be. And a little humiliating to be the “receptionist”, doing things behind the scenes or informing Batman of things Bruce can’t look at that moment because he’s too busy kicking ass. 

Whatever. He can deal with it.

For a month, tops. After this month ends, he will go after Bruce like a blood-hound.

“Mark my words,” He mutters to himself as he gets out of the shower, tugging his shirt down and pulling up his sweatpants. He can’t go back to the underground bomb-shelter that is his base now because all he has there is mostly for investigation. It has a place to sleep. A microwave. But it’s not exactly in tip-top shape to be lived in exactly.

Not to mention that people now know what his real face looks like under the Red Hood mask ( _ Thank you, Harvey Bullock. So helpful of you to take off my mask in front of the entire precinct. Not. _ ) and the enemies he had wronged with the Red Hood guise would be out for his blood.

Life was just perfect.

Jason found that his seething, rapid footsteps took him straight to the antique clock inside the living room. He changed the minutes and once it opened, climbed down it with a determined stomping variety of footsteps.

Bruce and Tim stood in the middle of the Batcave discussing something when they heard Jason’s boisterous steps toward them and stopped to look at his boiling face.

“Jason, how are--” Tim went to ask cordially.

“Are you any closer to this dipshit or not?” Jason interrupted with none of the sophistication. Tim’s eyebrows raised in surprise while Bruce looked on, unimpressed by his stampeding interruption.

Jason bristled at the unimpressed stare directed at him and turned to glare straight into Bruce’s head. “The month is about to end.” He snarled out with the blood very much floating up to his brain. “I’m so fucking sick of baking pies and trying to make different types of tomato sauces for different types of pastas that I’m dying a little bit.” He brought his hand up to show just how little with his fingers and thumb. “Just a little bit, I’m dying. Bruce, come on. Fucking help me. I’m so dead tired of all this shit. I’m so dead tired of it.”

Tim pressed his lips together and let his eyes go elsewhere as if he was ignoring Jason for Jason’s own good or stopping himself from making a smart-ass comment that would just boil Jason further. 

“Timbo,” He confronted the boy, who started at the attention. “Fucking what’s the hold-up, man? I thought you were a genius prodigy or whatever and Bruce--” He turned back to Bruce. “Do I need to hire your eleven-year-old kid for this? Because he feels a helluva lot smarter than you right now.”

Bruce’s bottom lip moved downward before it went back to its typical unmoving position. Thought seemed like the only thing Bruce was capable of at that moment.

“Oh my god, why aren’t you saying anything?” burst out Jason, and seeing as he was a short-fuse kinda guy, it shouldn’t really surprise Bruce that he was just done right about now. “What? What’s so weird over here? Jason Todd is freaking out very loudly? Yes, okay!” He spread out his hands, gesturing at himself. Hysteria getting the very best of him. “I deserve to freak out. I can’t handle the normal and slow life, okay!? It’s mundane. It’s strangely humbling and I’m thinking thoughts I shouldn’t be thinking and--” He looked at Bruce’s face and stopped himself from sliding his gaze, very deliberately, very aware of the thudding beat of his heart. “--it’s just too much time to think thoughts you shouldn’t think, okay?! So--”

He breathed in deeply. Then out. Then in. He stopped and just took a minute to recover.

Then Bruce finally spoke, “I think you just need some sleep,”

Jason sent a withering glare Bruce’s way and found the older man smiling in an amused manner back at him. Was he looking for a fight?

“We found the guy, Jason.” Tim finally decided to drop the bomb. Jason turned and blinked at the kid in surprise. Tim looked slightly more entertained than Bruce. “If you’d have given us a minute to talk over your blathering freak-out, you would have known that sooner and probably would have saved you the unnecessary increase of blood pressure.” He wrinkled his nose then and asked: “Do you even realize how many times you said the word ‘die’? Or ‘think’?”

“Well, excuse me,” Jason crossed his arms and huffed. “You would get suicidal too if you had nothing to do with your time but cook and think.” He bit out ‘think’ like it was venomous, which it was, no question there.

“Meh,” Tim seemed to shrug in disagreement. “You forget, I’ve quit being Robin before. I know how to live a normal life, man. I’m not an adrenaline junkie like you.”

“I am not an adrenaline junkie,” Jason retorted petulantly. He flickered his gaze to Bruce, who had remained silent for the most part, and jumped to the serious topic immediately: “So, the guy, you sure it’s him? How’d you find him? And when are you going to kick his ass for me? No, wait, I want to do that on my own. Maybe, you should take me with you when you go to catch that asshole.”

“He’s called Amnesiac,” Bruce finally said. “He’s from a Ukrainian town. Met some sort of mystical entity when he was little and it gave him some of its powers. He would have remained unsearchable if it weren’t for Doctor Fate encountering him during one of his expeditions through the spiritual plane. Anyway, we know his location for now and we were just going to go get him.” Bruce quirked his brow and it was specially designed to patronize Jason as he leveled it at the fuming man-child. “Before you pitched your fit.”

“Fuck you,” Jason spat out churlishly. Then squinted at Bruce a little harder. “You didn’t say ‘no’ to my going with you?”

Bruce shrugged and said: “I imagine when it comes to mystical things being set right, it’s better that the affected person is nearby.”

Jason felt his eyes widening as the ecstatic feelings thrilled up his arms and went right to his head. He raised up his fists and hissed a ‘Yes’ as he pulled it inward.

Tim snorted. 

“And Amnesiac works alone so there’s less risk of physical danger,” Bruce added quietly, more to himself.

Jason was too busy celebrating. He was finally getting out of this stuffy mansion for something that wasn’t grocery shopping or small errands that Alfred had to run daily for the well-being of Wayne Manor. Seriously. How did Alfred put up with it all?

“So when are we taking this train of badass to kick some pasty-white, mystical ass?” Jason asked with full jubilance.

Tim brought a hand up to cover the stretched grin on his face, but his shaking shoulder gave him away. Bruce looked unamused despite how hilarious Jason was, like the proper buzzkill. He didn’t use to be this bad back when Jason was younger and less trigger-happy. He used to be a little cooler. Not a whole lot but--

“As a matter of fact,” Bruce started with somewhat less enthusiasm than was requisite, his brows hiked up to his hairline as he replied: “Tonight.”

  
  
  
  
  


“You know how you wear spandex and I wear combat boots and leather?” Jason asked Tim rhetorically in a low voice as they lurked on the roof opposite Amnesiac’s location. Bruce-- correction, Batman stood by the ledge with his insular goggles on, checking out the lay of the land, so to speak. Tim, in the Red Robin suit (he could hear a long, cheesy ‘Red Robin’ intonation from that one ad he had seen on TV that one time), gave Jason an annoyed glance and pretended to ignore him. 

“It’s a sign of our difference.” Jason asserted with a smirk. “A sign of your bad sense of fashion, lack of hindsight, and excess of vanity. And Babs hundred percent agrees with me, look at her new updated outfit.”

Tim sighed heavily and said: “I liked you better when you were tip-toeing around me because I was helping you with something you had no idea how to fix.” 

“What? It’s true, you peacock.” Jason assured with playful adoration in his tone.

Tim seemed to press his lips in a thinner line, gathered his patience in his fists and turned to give Jason a thoroughly vexed look.

“You haven’t gotten your powers back yet, Jaybird.” Tim sneered in a very insulting way. Nobody called Jason Jaybird. Except for Roy. Tim knew that. Fucker, taking advantage of Jason’s inability to fight right now. “So I’d watch how you talk to the person who can beat your ass from New York to Canada.”

Jason, under his Red Hood mask, blinked in outrage and opened his mouth to lash out, quite loudly, at Tim that he hadn’t had the balls or some shit but Bruce let out a “shush” from his crouching position and they both shut up and turned back to the mission.

“Wait till I get my powers back, you giant pillock.” Jason muttered an an aside to Tim in a very low, warning voice. “I will eviscerate you until you’re just red-and-yellow string cheese.”

Tim chuckled. “You wish,”

Everyone was testing Jason’s patience these days. Well, okay then, see how he acted after his memory came back. Tim would rue the day he insulted Jason that blatantly. Rue!

“Alright,” Bruce said, finally putting down those goggles. “Amnesiac is in. You know the plan. Red, you go from the side. I enter from the window.” He pivoted to face Red Hood. “Hood, you stay here. We’ll call you if we need you.”

Jason nodded, despite his simmering disapproval of the plan. He wanted to go with them but he needed to be able to carry his weight around for that and he couldn’t exactly do that. 

At the moment. 

Still, the moment he was needed, he would jump in, guns blazing. No matter how much he didn’t know or remember how to handle them.

Oh, life would be so much better once he had his memory.

  
  
  
  


Batman had ambushed Amnesiac by the side of a wall, one arm on the white, pasty, mystical mercenary’s throat as he growled some demands at the man.

Amnesiac chuckled, gave some witty one-liners from what Jason could see from his vantage point. His vantage point being on the building opposite to Amnesiac’s temporary hotel, wearing Bruce’s insular goggles, looking in on the figures inside by their heat signatures and inferring their conversation on his own.

There was some more aggressive cajoling from Batman-- demands to set Jason right and Amnesiac probably disagreeing. Should Jason have brought a bag of popcorns with him because ooh, this was about to get juicy. The gory type of juicy.

Jason rolled his eyes. Right. Like Bruce would let this one be gor--

There was a thud as the mystical mercenary did some magical shit-- like telekinesis, except with a flash bomb-- and Bruce was thrown far across the living room. Or was it kitchen?

Whatever it was. Bruce struggled to get up on his feet and Jason clicked on his comm-link now that things actually looked like they would be getting interesting.

Heavy breathing crackled in through Batman’s line. Huffs and puffs that settled on Jason’s chest like assurances of the living.

“ _ You really shouldn’t underestimate me _ ,” Amnesiac said in that Ukrainian accent of his, brushing off nonexistent lint from his impeccably white suit. Too bad for him but his back was all dusty from being pushed to that wall. If Jason knew the how-to’s of fighting right now, he’d be all up in that face. “ _ I imagine it works for you-- the whole scary get-up and animalistic growl. But I’m not like the others _ .” That’s what they all said. “ _ You forget, I’ve made a deal with the equivalent of what is a devil. I stared at its three swollen, red eyeballs-- breathed in its wretched acidic smell-- touched the intestinal tract sliminess of its skin-- _ ” Gross. What was up with this guy? “ _ And I’ve been granted magic to erase time itself. _ ”

Memory. He was granted magic to erase memory. What a vain fool. Bruce ate grandiose bastards like these for breakfast.

Bruce took advantage of this pontificating moment and threw two batarangs towards the man. They froze before they could reach Amnesiac, however. Which made what Doctor Fate told Bruce an understatement. Because Amnesiac shouldn’t have been able to do that.

“Oh fuck,” Jason muttered aloud. Was that why Jason couldn’t move when Amnesiac had come up from behind him? That wasn’t fair. A thought hit him then. What if he could only do that kinda time-freezing shit on the people who were a certain inches closer to him? Because Bruce would be frozen in place right now too if the Mercenary was able to do that right now. And since the guy was a Mercenary, Jason was more than sure that Amnesiac would take advantage of every power of his if he had the chance. Those guys liked being one step up from their foes. It was kinda their MO.

But Bruce was moving around the man, cautiously, keeping his fighting stance, observing for signs of weaknesses.

“B,” He said in Batman’s comm-link, his mind moving furiously fast. “I think he can only affect you through that white gun of his or if you’re standing a few inches from him. I don’t think he’s powerful enough to affect you from that distance.”

“ _ I figured _ ,” Bruce said under his breath. Yeah, of course, he did.

“A _ nd do you think I don’t notice _ him _? _ ” And now Jason was seeing that Amnesiac’s finger was pointing right through the wall to where Jason was crouching.

“Uh,” Jason blinked. What the fuck?

“ _ You know, I spared him a little of the pain _ .” Amnesiac was pontificating, but about Jason this time. What the fuck? “ _ I could’ve done worse. But Black Mask just wanted him out of the way. And I shrugged, said, no skin off my back. He’s not an enemy of mine _ .” He went back to pointing at Bruce. “ _ But you-- you and your whole crew have earned my enmity tonight _ .”

“What did you do to the poor guy, Bruce?” Jason asked.

“ _ Shut up, Hood. I think he can hear you _ .” Tim said quietly from the other side of Amnesiac’s apartment entrance doorway. He had already unlocked the apartment door but was hiding outside until he had a clear advantage or until Bruce called for his help. One of the two.

“How the fuck can he hear--” Jason spat out aggressively.

“ _ Memory waves _ ,” interrupted Amnesiac as if hearing Jason’s question out of some damn miracle. He pointed at his temple now. “ _ I can feel them in the air. You’re right, Mr. Hood, I don’t have much effect on you after you’re a certain distance away from me. But I can still smell the delicious waves of your memories through the air. _ ”

_ Eek. He just called my memories delicious. _

Why was this guy so creepy?

“ _ Well _ ,” It seemed Tim shrugged as he got out of his hiding place and entered the apartment finally. Stood right in the middle of the meshed living room and kitchen with a rebellious bravery. “ _ Guess I don’t have to hide anymore _ .”

“ _ No, you don’t _ .” Amnesiac agreed, a hint of a predatory smile on his face.

“Red, be careful!” Jason said just as Amnesiac took out two guns out of his pockets.

“ _ Yeah, yeah _ ,” Tim said very nonchalantly. He took out his miniature bo stick, swung it around and got into fighting form with it elongated in his hand. “ _ I’m always careful. Unlike you _ .”

Jason shook his head to himself. That kid was so gonna get it from him, but he trusted Tim and his genius mind. He was quite honestly the Man With The Plan. Papa-Bat had nothing on Red Robin.

Then, the sparring began. Shots rang out but Batman and Red Robin dodged them all with some complicated maneuvers that Jason used to be able to do while yawning.

He had too much invested in this thing going right so he was all wound up within himself, waiting for a good outcome on this cruddy battle. Clenched fists, taut shoulders-- he was the image of impatience and desperation.

“ _ Red Robin _ !” Bruce said somewhere in the middle of the grappling. 

“ _ Got it _ ,” Tim shouted back as he grabbed one of the guns Bruce had disarmed from Amnesiac’s hands. Then Batman faced Amnesiac and it wasn’t even a fucking competition. He held the gun-toting wrist, twisted it until there was a sound of bones breaking. The gun fell out of the mercenary’s now-useless hand. As Amnesiac howled in pain, Batman slammed him with two very disorienting, powerful punches.

Jason gritted his teeth because yes, yes, yes! He wanted to punch the guy in the face on his own but Bruce doing it on his behalf was actually better, much better. 

“ _ Now _ ,” rumbled Batman in his raspy, snarly voice as he held up the man against a wall once again but this time, with Amnesiac barely conscious and losing blood fast. “ _ Give Red Hood his memories back! _ ”

Jason was all clenched up as he waited for Amnesiac’s response. Surely, he would do it now.

Amnesiac gurgled, blood probably filling his mouth as he opened his mouth. “ _ Okay _ ,” He said and Jason closed his eyes with an internal hiss of relief. “ _ I’ll do it _ ,”

“ _ Wait _ ,” Tim said all of a sudden, making Jason snap his eyes open instantly with a sense of alarm. Tim’s insular figure was moving toward Bruce’s, one hand outstretched. “ _ Batman, look out _ !”

There was a thin sound of a clanging object hitting the floor before a BOOM ripped out of the hotel room. Yellow-red flames and debris and smoke filled out his vision respectively. He ripped out his goggles and looked on and saw that the hotel room was on fire. The rest of the building was intact, which was a good thing because innocent bystanders were safe. Except where the fuck were Bruce and Tim? Did they get out in time?

He couldn’t hear anything on the comm for a minute. He unclicked and clicked the link off and then on. Static crackled his ear. And silence.

“Hello?” He asked through the comm. “B?” He swept his gaze through the burning room and to the rooftop of the hotel and seeing no-one in sight, he took a bracing breath.

_ Please be okay. Please be okay. _

“B? Red? Come on.” He unclicked and clicked the link off and on again. Gave out a frustrated growl. Checked out the premise again. 

Then he heard it.

It was a little whoop of a cough in his ear. Not in his comm-link ear. In the real one. He turned around and saw Tim and Bruce, covered in dust and slightly singed around the side, leaning on each other as they stooped on the floor.

“Shit,” Jason gave himself permission to swear as he moved toward them. Tim coughed again. Bruce-- Batman-- had his head ducked so he couldn’t see if the man was conscious or not. “You scared the hell out of me. What the hell happened? How did you get away in time? And where did you even come from?”

Tim looked up and gave him a glare for his  rapid-fire questions while he was still recovering from his almost-death slip. He let go of Bruce’s shoulder and stood up wobbly, blinking fast and hard. He walked a few steps and exhaled, grabbing the water tower beside him for support.

“He had a short-range grenade in his pocket. We didn’t notice it until too late.” Tim finally croaked out, his voice raspy and feeble. “I knew we couldn’t get out unless I did something drastic so I…” He paused, obviously reluctant and slightly conflicted to share this part, but he finally seemed to get over the hiccup and admitted: “I used my nanobots.”

Did Jason just hear that right? 

“Nanobots?” Jason echoed, incredulous. Tim sighed. 

“They’ve been under development. More of an experiment, really. Harper has been helping me out with them. I didn’t even know if it would help but--” He looked to Bruce and sighed again. “We had no time.”

“What’s wrong with Bruce though?” Jason asked, finally giving himself permission to approach Bruce and kneel in front of him. He looked carefully into the closed eyes, the tortured lines above his forehead and almost went to put his hand over Bruce’s agitated, hard-lined cheeks.

“I think the nanobots messed with his brain circuits,” Tim shrugged but not casually, just in a helpless ‘I don’t know’ gesture. “I think I’m less affected because I’ve gotten used to it.”

“You think? Do you know anything for sure?” Jason finally inquired, giving Tim a withering look. Angry that Tim had tried a stupid experiment without thinking about the consequences.

_ He’d be dead right now if it wasn’t for Tim _ . said his brain reasonably.

His withering glare died a quick death after that.

He was just feeling a bit protective about Bruce, but that always seemed to be a thing he fell back on when there was nothing else for him to fall back on. 

No memory. No Amnesiac. And now Bruce was--

A firm and heavy hand touched his shoulder and it was the familiarity of that weight, of that firm touch that Jason immediately recognized it for what it is. His heart might have skipped a beat in-between the milliseconds of surprise and then recognition. He turned to face Bruce whose grey-blue eyes were open and large and outright magnetizing.

_ Don’t think things like magnetizing _ , he chided himself.  _ Idiot. _

Correction, Bruce’s eyes looked intense. Which seemed to be a thing Bruce’s eyes fell back on after he went through some life-or-death situation.

“I’m fine,” Bruce said. A bit more hoarse sounding but still the same Batman voice. The man was never out for long, Jason had to remind himself again because he was good at forgetting. 

  
  
  


(He was very good at forgetting. But only because he  _ wanted _ to forget.

There were things Jason had told himself to get over a long time ago. It wasn’t always easy but if he kept his mind constantly occupied with the loudness of Roy’s absurd jokes or Tim countering his insults or Dick chiding him for whatever it was that he was doing wrong or beating up common criminals all in a day’s time-- well, it made it seem like he had gotten over it.

He even went halfway across the galaxy to help his Alien Warrior Princess friend take control of her planet once again.

Then events like this happened and Jason was right back to square one. As if he hadn’t ever even left.)

  
  


“You sure?” Jason questioned, checking Bruce head-to-toe just to see if there were wounds or scratches that hadn’t been there before. The man seemed okay, from the looks of it. But then again, Jason had looked fine all those weeks ago too when Amnesiac attacked him. 

“Yes,” Bruce affirmed. 

“Okay, then,” Jason moved back, putting a distance between them now that Bruce wasn’t in imminent danger of a brain bleed or something. He hefted himself up and swung a look between Tim and Bruce. “So does anyone know what happened to that mystical asshole?”

Tim frowned, bemused. Bruce had gotten up by then and there wasn’t much in his expression to take away from.

Jason sighed, rubbing his sweaty hands on his jeans. “So mission fail, huh?”

He tried not to look morose at Tim’s speechlessness and the sinking of his shoulders, but that was how he felt like looking now. Now that the fire had cleared and smoke was left in its wake. He pursued his lips, drawing back a few more steps and jumbling his fingers inside his jeans. Maybe… he’d have to give up even if he didn’t want to. Maybe, he’d like cooking and doing other domestic shit.

“Not exactly,” Bruce said then.

Jason looked up at the tilt of Bruce’s head, which was about the only sign that there was more than speechless disappointment to look forward to. Bruce lifted a white gun from under his cape and left both Tim and Jason staring at him with gaping mouths.

“I reckon we can get Blood to help us with recalibrating the…” Bruce paused, brow crinkled as he tested the limit of his denial. He forged ahead anyway: “--‘magic’ in this gun and get you your memory back,”

A reluctant smile teased the edges of Jason’s mouth after he recovered from the shock. 

“You’re way too good, B.” He commented, feeling his heart soar with feelings unnamed.

On Bruce’s schooled face, a little fleeting curve around his lips formed and Jason felt his heart ripple under the pressure of his soaring feelings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

( _ Fucking get over it, dude.  _ The voice inside his head hissed at him.

_ Fuck you,  _ His heart replied defiantly. A little bit spitefully, even.  _ Dude. _

Jason was a war inside his body. A hair-trigger away from exploding the whole world into pieces-- into the pits of hell itself, releasing in the air the resounding scream that was his passion.   
  


His feelings.

They sung like this sometimes:

_ I need you now. I need you more than ever before.  _

Utterly like the twang of a bow softly brushing against the strings of a violin. Against his heartstrings. 

Sometimes, they sang like:

_ I can feel it. I can feel it.  _

Like a boat in the sea. Waves riding over waves. In and out.

Like the beat of his heart. They thumped in and out of him.

They crooned incomplete lyrics like:

_ If you and I. Oh, if you and I. You and I... _

Sometimes, they tore into him like the claws of vultures. They nipped at his feet like shadows at night. 

They were a barely heard whisper in the calm autumnal nights:

_ Please, tell me everything’s okay. _

Sometimes, they were a recurring show-stopping tragedy ringing through cathedral walls like a lament-- like white-hot adrenaline-- like red-hot desperation-- like the blood dropping out of his wounds under the drizzling hot spray of his shower.

_ Now that I can say whatever I want, I got no words. I got no words. No words.  _

  
  


_ No words. _ )

 


End file.
